Seven Habits of Highly Effective Sex Poodles
by Doyle-sb4
Summary: XanderAnya. It's a very ordinary summer. Xander doesn't mind so much. (After Restless, before Buffy vs Dracula)


Title: Seven Habits of Highly Effective Sex Poodles  
  
Author: Doyle  
  
Fandom: Buffy  
  
Pairing: Anya/Xander  
  
Rating: R  
  
Spoilers: set in season 4, but spoilers for seasons 5 and 6  
  
Summary: It's a very ordinary summer. Xander doesn't mind so much.  
  
Years later, Xander categorized his summers like episodes of Friends. There was The One With the Fabulous Ladies and The One After Buffy Ran Away and – far worse – The One After Buffy Died.  
  
By default, the summer he turned twenty became The One Where Nothing Happened. It was the Seinfeld of Sunnydale summers. Between May's destruction of the Initiative and dream-attack by the First Slayer and Dracula's September visit stretched nearly four months of nothingness. No major evil arose. The town remained spectacularly demon-free. Even the vamps seemed to take a vacation. Patrol dwindled to a quick tour of the empty cemeteries. Scooby meetings became video nights.  
  
It took age and experience to make him realize that that summer was probably the best of his life.  
  
--  
  
Anya was reading when he got back from his deliveries. The sight made him nervous. Anya reading generally meant Anya scheming something, and that way lay either evisceration or bankruptcy.   
  
Not that he was some kind of chauvinist, he hastened to add. No caveman-making evil beer for the Xanman.  
  
"Hey, whatcha reading?" he asked, tossing the pizza box onto the top of the dryer.  
  
She didn't look up. "Just a sex book. Did you get anchovies?"  
  
"Ahn, you don't need a sex book. You could write a sex book."  
  
"No, it's for you," she said cheerfully. "I thought it would help you get over your repression. The woman at the library was very helpful."  
  
Xander could actually feel his brain cease functioning. "You… at the library…"  
  
"Oh, I told her you're an untamed stallion in the sack," she assured him. "Just that you need some encouragement to. You know. Play kinky sex games with the other horses." She looked pleased at her own metaphor.  
  
So that was why Mrs. Marlin had answered the door in her negligee. And asked him inside for a drink. And ordered three pizzas in one night. Munchies, his ass.  
  
He sat on the bed. She scootched up to make room. "Anya," he said, taking her hand, "when we're together, it's good, right? It's great. And there's kink. I'd go so far as to say that we're a kink-heavy couple." Sure, the only thing he could think of right away was the spanking, but that counted as kink. A fetish, even. He squeezed her hand. "Not wanting a threesome with Giles does not make me repressed."  
  
She looked unconvinced for a moment, then shrugged. "Okay. I guess you're right."  
  
The little Xander in his brain did a sedate, relieved version of the Snoopy dance.  
  
"It's just a shame," Anya sighed. "Page eighty-one looks exciting."  
  
The book was right there on the bed. She'd left it open.  
  
Curse his curiosity.  
  
"Yeah," he squeaked, when he could tear his attention away. He cleared his throat. "Yeah. Y'know, I've been thinking, maybe I should read more."  
  
--  
  
The next night was a Tuesday. Tuesday meant hanging at Giles's place and real food instead of takeout.  
  
"This is great, Giles," he tried to say around a mouthful of spaghetti. It came out as "thsgrhhjuh".  
  
"It's magically delicious," Willow chimed in. "Except without the magic."   
  
"Or the creepy little leprechaun," Buffy added.  
  
"I think he's cute," Willow's girlfriend said, blushing. She had a name, Xander knew, but it was going to take a while to get used to calling her Tara. He was stuck on mentally calling her 'Willow's girlfriend', with varying emphasis. Willow's girlfriend. Willow's girlfriend.   
  
Anya sat across the table. Every so often she'd look up at him and smile and shift her socked foot a little in his lap.  
  
At least, he hoped it was Anya's foot. He liked Riley and all, but he wasn't ready for that kind of relationship.  
  
After dinner he sprawled on the couch while Will and Giles set up the board for Clue and talked about why it was called Cluedo in England. Willow's girlfriend was curled in the armchair looking through a dusty old book. Riley flipped through Giles's music collection – Xander briefly wondered where Oz was now – and Buffy sat beside him, laughing whenever he said something funny.  
  
He hadn't seen Buffy happy like that in forever. Looking at her like that made him warm inside. These last couple of years he'd gone from wanting her to just wanting her to be happy. If he had a hat, he'd tip it to Riley. Maybe he could settle for a manly handshake.  
  
Wait, somebody was missing.  
  
He frowned. Where'd Anya disappeared to?  
  
"She said she was going to freshen up," Willow's g… Tara supplied quietly.  
  
He smiled at her. God, she blushed at anything. That was adorable. "Thanks. I better go see if she's okay."  
  
"You want us to wait?" Willow asked.  
  
"Nah, go ahead. I think it was Colonel Mustard. Can't trust the military types." He raised his hands in mock fear at Riley's amused look. "Present company completely accepted."  
  
As he headed for the bathroom he stopped and stage-whispered to Tara, "hey, keep the soldier-guy away from the candlesticks. He's got that murderous look in his eye."  
  
Having all his friends together, and having them laughing, was more than worth all the crap they'd gone through that spring.  
  
He got as far as tapping on the bathroom door before he was yanked inside.  
  
"Finally," Anya said. "I thought you were never going to get a clue. Take off your pants."  
  
Ms. Jenkins, in the bathroom, with the hand lotion.  
  
--  
  
Four a.m. was far too early to be barricading himself in his own shower.  
  
"What's wrong?" Anya yelled from the other side of the door.  
  
"Tongue, Ahn!" he shouted back. "Tongue in place where no tongue should be!"  
  
When his boss asked why he was walking strangely, he made up an excuse about falling onto a pylon while saving an old lady from purse-snatchers.  
  
--  
  
He sidled up to the hot blonde on the Bronze's catwalk. She was staring disdainfully down at the dancing crowd below.  
  
"Buy you a drink?"  
  
She spared him a quick glance before going back to her bored people-watching. "Are you old enough?"  
  
"Twenty-five," he said smoothly. "I'm a property developer."  
  
The blonde tossed her hair as she turned to face him. "Name?"  
  
"Ramon Steel."  
  
"Apartment?"  
  
"Tastefully decorated. Two fifty K a year."  
  
"Vacations?"  
  
"Summer in the Hamptons, Winter in the Med." He smiled. "It's a private island."  
  
"Favorite sexual position?"  
  
Dammit! "Whatever gives the most pleasure to you," 'Ramon' improvised.  
  
She smiled, holding out her hand to be kissed. "Consuella Maris Bettina Naratalova. I'm the daughter of a European King."  
  
"Which country?" he couldn't help but ask.  
  
She shrugged. "One of the little insignificant ones in the middle. We have our own mountain range." She sashayed close to him, wrapping an arm around his waist. "But enough of this small talk. Take me, Mr. Steel. Let's go to your car"  
  
This was where the game stalled, because while Ramon had a fleet of convertibles that were soaped down every day by a dedicated team of community-spirited cheerleaders (the book had said his fantasy persona should be as specific as possible), the best Xander could do was a grope in the back of a pizza delivery van. And those boxes had sharp corners.  
  
Then again… the catwalk was deserted. And did the Bible not say 'greater love hath no man than this, that he shall risk public humiliation and possible arrest to make his girlfriend happy'?  
  
"Why not just have fun here?" he said with what he hoped was a roguish leer, drawing her back into the shadows.  
  
Anya – Consuella – looked like Christmas Day had arrived five months early.  
  
--  
  
It was safe to go out on a limb and say that grocery shopping was not one of Xander's favorite activities. Combine that with running into a certain bleached-blond acquaintance and it could just about add up to the Worst Friday Ever.  
  
Spike jerked his head in the direction of another aisle. "Shouldn't you be over there with the rest of the puff pastries?"  
  
"Shouldn't you be having happy vamp-time inside a dust-buster?" he sniped back.  
  
In total honesty, he kind of admired how Spike could still be so in-your-face with that neutering chip in his head.   
  
He promised that nothing would ever make him be that honest.  
  
The vampire plucked a pack of cookies from the shelf. It was like the magic tricks Uncle Rory used to try at Christmas, except this actually worked – one minute there was a box of cookies, the next it had disappeared inside the leather duster.  
  
"Are you shoplifting?!" Xander hissed.  
  
Spike's eyes widened to anime proportions. "Heavens, no!" he said. "People will start to think I'm evil." A packet of breadsticks went the same route as the cookies.  
  
"Doesn't the chip zap you? I mean, stealing hurts people."  
  
"And I feel Mr. Walmart's pain." He cocked his head to one side. "No, wait, I don't."  
  
"I'm telling Buffy," Xander said, trying not to feel like he was in fifth grade again. "I mean, she let you live when you sold us out to Adam so I think you owe her…" He trailed off. Spike was clearly not listening to a word. He looked far more interested in the contents of Xander's shopping cart.  
  
Not going to blush, Xander ordered himself, even as the heat started to spread across his face. Everybody buys condoms.  
  
And latex gloves.  
  
And whipped cream.  
  
And cucumbers.  
  
The knowing smirk Spike gave him was probably classed as sexual harassment in most states.  
  
"Quiet night at home, then? Demon girl give you the push?"  
  
"Shut up, Spike," he muttered.  
  
At least if you didn't know what he wanted the rubber bands for, they looked innocent. No deviant activity here.  
  
Oh, who was he kidding.  
  
--  
  
"You have the keys for these, right?" he joked.  
  
The false, manic grin that froze on his girlfriend's face was a terrifying sight to behold.  
  
"Oh God," he moaned. It took up a chant in his brain. Oh God, oh God, oh God… maybe some passing deity would take pity on him. Alternatively, they might decide his calling in life was as a lightning rod. "Anya? Keys. Keys, Ahn."   
  
"I left them in the van," she said. "I hope."  
  
"You hope?!"  
  
He'd seen her practise that smile. Hell, he'd chosen that smile. She'd specifically asked him which one he thought most conveyed the impression 'please don't be mad at me. How could you be mad at someone this adorable?'.  
  
"I'll be right back!" She was already hurrying to where they'd parked the car.  
  
"Hey! What if there are vampires?"  
  
"Don't worry," she called over her shoulder. "I saw Buffy and Riley when we pulled up. They must be patrolling the park. Or pretending to be normal, going on a moonlit stroll, blah di blah."  
  
Xander tried to respond, but he'd forgotten how to speak English.  
  
The summer breeze wafted gently over parts that he didn't really want wafted. The railings were cold against his ass, but he couldn't pull away without the cuffs biting into his wrists.  
  
He had a feeling that the next time he had the nightmare about being naked in front of his entire class, it was going to be taken to a whole new dimension.  
  
Footsteps behind him. Crap.  
  
He prayed for vampires. Maybe a demon set on making him its immortal bride.  
  
"Oh my God, Xander?"  
  
The lightning rod option would have been better. "Hey, Buffy, Riley," he said weakly. "Nice night, huh?"  
  
--  
  
A whole year after graduating from Sunnydale High, not having to waste Sunday night copying Willow's homework was still cool. He could spend that extra time improving his mind or contemplating his place in the universe or - okay, he spent it reading the new Starman. But still, cooler than homework.  
  
Upstairs, he could just about hear Anya greeting his mom, and he hurriedly tossed the comics under the bed.  
  
When she came down the stairs he was draped over the bed in the most elegantly casual way he could manage. He liked to show her he was making an effort to spice things up. The aloof, slightly brooding pose was based on Angel.  
  
Not that… he'd never… he hadn't imagined Deadboy like that, or had a dream along those lines, or even given any thought to it. Ever ever ever.  
  
Anya looked quite pleased to be pounced on.  
  
After a minute he stopped mid-paw, curiosity winning out over horniness and macho pride. "What's in the bag? Dry-cleaning?"  
  
She undraped the garment bag from over her arm and laid it in the bed. "Open it."  
  
His hand hovered over the zipper. "Is it a surprise?"  
  
She nodded eagerly. "Since this is your last night as a stupid mortal teenager, I thought we could do something special."  
  
"Kinda been a special week," he said, but opened the bag anyway.  
  
Had to hand it to her, sometimes Anya got it totally right. "Sexy nurse's uniform," he said approvingly. "Nice."  
  
She hugged him.  
  
"Wait, isn't it way too big for you?"  
  
She had her insufficient data cannot compute expression. "For me?"  
  
--  
  
Waking up aged twenty was surprisingly similar to waking up aged nineteen and three hundred and sixty-four days. He waited for maturity to hit him. Yup, any minute now he'd be talking like Giles and planning on getting a real job, something with security.  
  
After a half hour all that had changed was that he needed to pee. He padded off to the bathroom, happily concluding that he was never going to grow up.  
  
When he got back, Anya was sitting up in bed, rubbing her eyes.  
  
"Happy birthday," she yawned.  
  
He crawled back into the warm space beside her. She snuggled against him.  
  
"Goodbye stupid mortal teenager, hello stupid mortal twenty-something," he announced. The realization hit him all of a sudden: he'd survived his teenage years. In Sunnydale, that was a hell of an achievement.  
  
Plenty of kids weren't so lucky. He thought about his twelfth birthday, when Jesse's mom baked a cake because his own mother forgot, and he unconsciously held Anya a little tighter.  
  
'You're a total freakshow,' Jesse's ghost, frozen forever at sixteen, said in his mind. 'Dude, do not go angsting over me when you have a hottie like that in bed. Is she naked under there?'  
  
He smiled sadly, and let the memory go. Not something to think about today.  
  
Anya was indeed completely naked, and between the leg nudging between his and the soft breasts pressed against his side, he was beginning to entertain suggestions from little Xander regarding certain illustrations from that book. There were bunches of things that could be done indoors, required no equipment and were probably legal in a minimum of thirty states.  
  
Then again, he couldn't exactly have predicted a year ago that he'd wake up wrapped around a gorgeous, funny, intelligent woman who wanted to be his girlfriend. It'd be nice, maybe, to do absolutely nothing for a while. Just enjoy this. Enjoy her.  
  
"Xander?" Her breath was tickly against his chest. "Now that the ritual birthday greetings are done, can I go back to sleep?"  
  
Xander kissed the top of her head. "So long as there's cake and presents in my near future, you do whatever you want, sweetie."  
  
"There'll be cake at the surprise party," she said. "At Buffy's house. I hope no-one's gift is better than mine."   
  
He grinned at the ceiling. "Surprise party, huh?"  
  
She was already asleep.  
  
END 


End file.
